Christopher Smith wrote:
On Feb 8, 2005, at 7:52 PM, David W. Fenton wrote:
I just pointed out that if the music is incomprehensible without reference to outside information that is not musical in nature, then it's not very good music.
Well, I guess we will have to agree to disagree there. I don't know of very much art that DOESN'T require cartloads of outside information to understand or enjoy it.
I'm glad just the same to finally understand your point, even if I don't agree with it.
I agree with David Fenton here -- if a casual listener can't just hear a piece of music and enjoy it without any exposure to anything other than that piece of music, then it isn't very good music. If a musical work requires a lecture to precede it, pointing out this aspect and that aspect, then it's more like a lecture that needs a musical example to make it's point than a work of music that should simply need to be heard.
Sure some works can be more deeply appreciated if one looks behind the score to the thoughts behind the music, just as a Maserati can be more deeply appreciated if one understands engineering and machining principles and aerodynamic designs and wheel rim materials and tire tread constructions. But I can't think of anybody who would buy a car in which they originally hated the test drive simply because they heard an explanation of how it was conceived and suddenly came to love it. If it rides terribly, it doesn't matter how it was conceived. Same thing for a work of music -- if the listener doesn't enjoy it, it doesn't matter what masonic symbolism is involved or what their compositional philosophy is.
To paraphrase Duke Ellington: If it sounds bad it IS bad (at least to the person who thinks it sounds bad).
I can hear the conversation concerning a musical work now:
Listener: Wow, that is horrible. I think I'm going to get sick, it's so ugly!
Composer: But this is how I conceived it: First, I thought of my long extramarital affair and how it allowed me to finally know love, then I thought of all my fellow countrymen who were killed in battles for freedom, finally I decided to throw off the weight of the harmonic expectations built up by the composers of the common harmonic practice period.
Listener: Gee, I'm glad you told me -- that is one beautiful work of music, I love it!
-- David H. Bailey [EMAIL PROTECTED] _______________________________________________ Finale mailing list [email protected] http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
